HR Checklist For Startups & Modern Companies [Key Action Points]
Karolina Kulach
Senior Content Marketing Expert (HR & Payroll)
This practical HR Checklist will help startups and modern companies build HR strategy that fully supports business growth.
The checklist includes detailed sections, essential questions, and action points for HR professionals and founders/CEOs to help them build effective people processes and company teams.
Use this HR Checklist to reach your business growth goals quicker:
Address key HR priorities in growing/modern companies and align your people strategy with business goals
Implement (or improve) essential HR processes for hiring top talent, engaging and retaining employees, staying compliant, building your brand, etc.
Identify what needs decisive action right now
Start your HR processes from scratch or transform/audit your current strategy
And of course, get an endorphin rush - ticking items off a list feels good!
Businesses fail 23% of the time due to inadequate people working on their team (CB Insight). Don’t let it happen to your company.
Engage your employees successfully throughout the whole year with our HR Calendar & HR Planner!
*The information, data, and guidance provided in this article is for general information purposes only and does not constitute professional or legal advice.
HR checklists: practical tools that make HR easier
This HR Checklist will help you make your HR-related tasks more manageable and get things done effectively and on time.
What are the benefits of using HR checklists?
HR checklists help you manage the entire employee lifecycle and keep track of your business goals. Checklists make your goals more attainable by breaking them down into smaller pieces.
HR checklists help startups and modern companies:
Identify and prioritize all the steps required for building HR and people processes, including specific tasks and deadlines
Minimize the risk of “forgetting-to-do-something” and wondering “what-should-I-do-next”
Reduce costly errors
Make delegating tasks easier
Have control over tasks, track progress, and stay focused
Increase a sense of accomplishment, confidence, and motivation
What should HR checklists include?
Comprehensive HR checklists should include the most important HR functions, such as:
Organizational structure and culture
Recruitment, hiring, and onboarding
Compliance, documentation, and policy upkeep
Employee data collection and storage
Employee salaries and benefits
Payroll management
Employee engagement and retention
Assessing performance and training
Collecting and giving employee feedback
Using HR technology / HRIS (Human Resources Information System)
Now let’s focus on the details.
HR Checklist for startups and modern companies
Use the following HR Checklist to answer crucial questions about your company, employees, people processes, and plans for business growth. Then take the necessary steps to create an optimal HR strategy for your organization.
SYMMETRICAL’S HR CHECKLIST: CONTENTS
#1. Organizational structure
#2. Recruitment, hiring, and onboarding Job posting and advertising Application process and screening Interviews Hiring Onboarding
#3. Compliance with employment laws and work regulations Compliance, company policies, and documentation Employee data collection and storage Employment contracts Employee salaries and benefits Termination procedures and offboarding
#4. Payroll management
#5. Company culture, employee engagement and retention
#6. Collecting & providing feedback and performance management Collecting employee feedback Performance management, providing feedback & training
#7. Using HR technology / HRIS
HR Checklist: organizational structure
How will you structure your organization (teams, sub-teams, etc.)? Who will you need on your team? Who will report to whom?
Do you have a good understanding of why you need specific roles and their business value? Have you considered short-term and long-term costs?
Has a team analysis been conducted by both HR and CEO/COO/ founders/managers?
How will you decide which roles must be filled first/next (consider essential vs. nice-to-have, permanent vs. temporary, hard skills vs. soft skills)?
Do you always need new employees? Can a role be filled by existing employees or software?
How will managers request new hires? Who will approve new hire requests?
How will you make sure the right tasks/projects are assigned to the right employees (consider the level of seniority, competence, experience, and individual preferences)?
How will you organize your teams in terms of expertise? Do you prefer a team of experienced experts or a mix of senior and junior employees?
How will you ensure effective team collaboration, especially when different team members have different experience levels and areas of expertise?
How can you attract suitable candidates and create interest among them?
How will you advertise job openings? Where will you post open roles? Will you use your personal network?
What recruitment channels will you use to find new employees (e.g. LinkedIn, job fairs, posting new openings on job boards)?
How much can you spend on recruitment channels?
How will you define and assess the ROI from specific channels/job boards?
What will you focus on in your job descriptions? Do you have useful templates?
Are your job descriptions precise enough to help you attract the right candidate?
Have you included your company’s description, the information about its culture, perks, and so on?
Have you researched the job market? Do you have enough data for specific industries, e.g. the availability of competent/senior candidates, candidate experience metrics, candidates-per-opening, cost-per-hire, time-to-hire, job offer acceptance rate metrics, salary information, etc.?
Have you determined salary ranges for specific roles? Will you include them in your job advertisements?
How will you discuss salary expectations with candidates, especially if you decide not to share your salary ranges?
Application process and screening
How can you make your application process smooth and short (without compromising on its quality)
How will you decide if a candidate is the right fit for both the role and your startup?
How will you screen for candidates that match your company values?
Do you have a hiring and candidate assessment plan (e.g. culture fit, working and communication style, soft skill assessment, technical assessment, etc.)?
How will you ensure non-discriminatory hiring? How will you find candidates that represent diverse backgrounds?
Who screens applications? Who communicates with candidates? Who makes final hiring decisions?
You can never be 100% sure you’re hiring a perfect employee. Actions speak louder than words, and evaluating the quality of someone’s work takes time. However, using qualified people to assess candidates will radically reduce the risk of costly hiring mistakes.
Kasia Gorska, Head of People & Culture at Symmetrical
Interviews
Which interview method is best for your company/specific roles: in-person or remote interviews?
What’s your interview length and format?
How many job interviews will there be in your hiring process?
Who will interview potential new hires?
Do you have a set of questions for each interviewer? Will there be technical tests?
What questions will you ask every candidate to assess their compatibility with your workplace culture?
Hiring
How will you communicate your decisions (both positive and negative)?
How will you give constructive feedback to both hiring managers and candidates?
Do you have an offer letter template, relevant agreements and clauses, and equity paperwork?
How and where will you gather essential employee data, e.g. social security/national insurance numbers, addresses, etc.?
How can you create a repeatable hiring process?
How will you speed up responses and feedback from hiring managers?
How will you make the whole process smooth?
Onboarding
How will you ensure you have the onboarding process before the candidate accepts the offer?
How will you structure onboarding? What will you cover during orientation?
Which documents will new hires have to sign before they start?
How will you collect all the required paperwork?
How will you make sure new hires are set up for success from day 1?
Where will you store the most important information and links for new employees?
How will you introduce new hires to your culture?
How will you make sure new hires are familiar with your business and their contribution to its operations and growth?
How will you make new employees feel welcome in the organization and the team?
HR Checklist: compliance with employment laws and work regulations
Compliance, company policies, and documentation
How will you ensure compliance, health, and safety?
Who will make sure legal company documentation is in place at all times?
What will your company structure documents include?
Do you have policies for workplace safety and harassment?
What expectations do employees need to meet to get and stay employed?
Do you have all the necessary guidelines to develop a healthy company culture?
How will you document your policies (e.g. paid leave, holidays, attendance system), task processes, meeting minutes, etc.?
How will you access relevant documents in the quickest way?
How will you inform employees of policy changes?
Have you informed workers of your right to change policies?
Employee data collection and storage
Can you store, update, and track employee data in a centralized way?
How will you store various kinds of data, e.g resumes, sensitive information, performance evaluations, workplace accidents, sick time, etc.?
How will you collect document signatures?
How will you store signed documents?
How will you ensure the security of employee data?
How will you comply with GDPR and/or other relevant data protection acts and regulations?
Does your HRIS software enable employees to protect their privacy, e.g. by hiding specific fields in their public profile?
Employment contracts
Are you able to offer different types of employment (full-time and part-time employees, contractors, freelancers, etc.)?
Do you have all the necessary rules and regulations for each employment type (e.g. holiday policies, benefits, bonuses, etc.)?
How many hours do you expect your employees to work in a week? Do you prefer a time-based or task-based working system?
What’s your view on working overtime? What will be your overtime policy, including overtime payments?
What will be your paid time off policy?
How will you handle sick days and personal days?
Employee salaries and benefits
What should your organization set as starting pay for each role (based on labor market trends and your budget)?
What’s fair and realistic in terms of compensation?
Can you offer competitive compensation for your industry? Can you offer an attractive pay structure?
How often will you review compensation?
How will you cover the benefits required by law?
Which basic benefits (e.g. health and retirement benefits) can you offer?
Can you offer competitive employee benefits? Which unique benefits and perks can you offer?
Can you offer health and retirement benefits for employees and their families?
Do the benefits that you offer reflect your company culture? For example, if you promote a work-life balance, you can offer flexible working hours, a 4-day work week, remote work, or yoga classes.
Can you offer an attractive holiday, vacation, and sick days policy?
Termination procedures and offboarding
How will you ensure that letting your employee go is an objective, performance-based process? How will you keep detailed records of warnings and communicate a corrective action plan?
Do you have all the processes (exit interviews, feedback, collecting company property, etc.)?
How will you make sure that you handle terminations with grace and dignity(e.g. wishing leavers good luck, offering writing recommendations for them if appropriate, etc.)?
HR Checklist: payroll management
How will you ensure you process payroll regularly and correctly?
Will you handle payroll yourself, or will you outsource it?
Who will be responsible for managing payroll?
Is your accounting department properly set up to create documentation and clarify potential payroll questions?
Which system/technology will you use for payroll processing?
If you already have a payroll system, how effective is it? Do you have to handle repetitive admin tasks, manual data entry, and salary calculations?
Do you have to hire accountancy firms, tax advisors, or other experts to make sure you process payroll correctly? If yes, how does it work for you (consider the cost, process efficiency/effectiveness, and the frequency and gravity of payroll errors)?
How much time do you spend on correcting payroll errors per week/month? If payroll errors are an issue, what are their consequences and costs?
Have you missed any critical payroll-related deadlines in the last 3/6/12 months? If yes, what were they, and what were their consequences?
Is your payroll system flexible enough to operate well in non-standard situations, such as high turnover, high-volume hiring, calculating bonuses, deductions, or paying gig workers and/or employees from different countries?
HR Checklist: company culture, employee engagement and retention
How will you ensure high employee engagement and retention in each team and at every level of seniority?
How will you create an environment where employees want to work?
How will you demonstrate that you have created a strong, transparent company culture?
When will you start creating company values? Who will be responsible for this: HR/founders /employees?
How will you demonstrate you advocate a work-life balance (e.g. instigating mandatory time off, allowing flexible schedules and work-from-home opportunities, offering massage vouchers, company-financed equipment, etc.)?
How will you make sure your employees are happy and satisfied? Who will represent their interests?
Have you already observed a high employee turnover at your company? If yes, what are the reasons? Do you need to dig deeper to understand it better?
How will you identify and protect employees from toxicity in the workplace?
How will you handle conflict in your workplace?
Will you consider non-traditional methods of increasing employee engagement/satisfaction/happiness (e.g. getting rid of job titles and/or creating customized positions)?
How will you ensure your HR/payroll team has enough time to boost employee engagement, employer branding activities, and other strategic tasks?
HR Checklist: collecting & providing feedback and performance management
Collecting employee feedback
What kind of feedback matters to your organization?
What are the most important feedback areas for your company as a whole and employees as individuals?
When will you conduct the first employee satisfaction survey (NPS/pulse check)?
How will you ensure you get reliable results and honest answers?
How will you ensure the quality of feedback processes?
How will you make sure employees are willing to give feedback and make time for this?
Which tools will you use to collect feedback (e.g. Google Forms, one-on-one discussions)?
Will you talk to people directly about their concerns to better understand a problem (recommended)?
How can your employees express opinions, complaints, and dissatisfaction, also on an ad-hoc basis?
How will you make sure employees feel comfortable having open, honest conversations?
How will you ensure employee feedback has been addressed, and your staff sees their opinion matters?
How can collecting feedback help you improve employee engagement?
Performance management, providing feedback & training
How will you determine your expectations for employees, especially if you have no past data to rely on?
How will you measure job performance? Have you considered an outcome-based model?
Will you use goal-setting methods, such as KPIs or OKRs?
Will you create short-term and long-term company and individual goals?
Who will be responsible for goal setting and tracking?
Which tools will you use to monitor goals?
What system will you provide for managers and team leaders to assess, track, and report performance?
What will be your feedback process?
How will you ensure that your employees receive constructive feedback?
How will you assess whether employees are growing and developing at the right pace (consider their professional and personal goals)?
What resources will your managers need to train new employees?
How will you identify the gaps in the current skill set and training needs?
How will you define and assess seniority levels for specific roles?
How will you avoid giving wrong promotions and claiming a wrong seniority level?
If you identify an incorrect title/seniority assignment, how will you fix it?
HR Checklist: using HR technology / HRIS
Are you already using modern HR and payroll technology / HRIS? Are you making the most of it?
If you don’t have any HR tech (HRIS system) in place, which HR and payroll tasks can you automate? How much time can it save you?
If you’re using HRIS software, does it allow you to automate most of your hiring process?
Can you post to multiple job boards with one tool? Can you create your own custom career site? Can you screen resumes and schedule interviews?
Do you have a single system for managing employees, employee data, and multiple processes?
Do you have an effective and efficient employee database? If yes, is it well-integrated with other systems?
Does your HRIS allow you to store employee data in one place in a secure way? Does it prevent duplicate data entry?
Can you properly track, manage, and approve employee time-off requests on a single platform?
Does your HR/payroll platform work well as a self-service tool? Can employees view their leave balances and payslips? Can they change personal information in the system?
Does your HRIS come with built-in HR reporting features? Can you track important HR metrics (application dropout rate, employee productivity, etc.)?
Does your HRIS allow you to understand which processes are working for your company and which aren’t, and how you can fix them?
Is your HRIS capable of handling global hiring and remote workforce?
Suppose you don’t use HR tech yet. Have you decided what is important for you when choosing HR and payroll providers (for example, the amount of backend administration needed, available integrations, the self-service capabilities and tools available to employees, e.g. dashboards, calculators, or online support)?
Does your company resist automation? If yes, what are the main reasons behind it?
HR Checklist: conclusion
In startups and growth-minded organizations:
Having a high-performing workforce driven by purpose is a must.
CEOs and other C-level executives should focus on the company’s vision, mission, and product innovation.
Therefore, company processes, policies, people, and HR-related matters should be HR’s job so C-level executives are not distracted from their primary focus.
Busy HR professionals, in turn, should make the most of HR checklists and other practical tools, including automated solutions. This way, they can reduce their workload by not adding unnecessary tasks and confusion caused by inefficient planning and excessive manual work.
Therefore, Symmetrical is here to help busy HR and payroll professionals.
Symmetrical is a better way to run payroll and HR admin. It enables fast-paced companies to onboard at scale and run their payroll invisibly. To run your payroll hassle-free and on autopilot, contact our HR & payroll experts to learn more!
I'm a non-fiction writer, content manager and a passionate digital content creator. I have a huge interest in topics related to employee experience and employment trends in the world of Payroll & HR. I'm also a well-travelled individual with international education and work experience gained in London, Scotland, Poland and Germany. In my spare time I buzz with creative content ideas, including funky rhyming poems.
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